Ever since the first Tesla Semis were delivered on December 1, 2022 to PepsiCo, the Class 8 electric truck has been spotted several times on the road, generating excitement among fans every single time.
Up until now, only MotorTrend spotted more than one Tesla Semi in one place during its recent visit to Frito-Lay’s facility in Modesto, California. Now we get to see how a large group of Tesla Semis looks like courtesy of a post on the r/teslamotors subreddit.
User mariorestini posted two photos taken at Frito-Lay’s site that show at least eight Tesla Semis parked side by side. Five of the electric semi-truck tractors are painted white, while three of them carry Frito-Lay’s red and yellow livery with white brand lettering on the sides of the cab.
This sighting proves that Tesla continues to deliver Semis to PepsiCo, although it remains unclear how many trucks have been shipped to the company’s facilities in Modesto and Sacramento so far. MotorTrend spotted six Tesla Semis during its visit to Modesto in late January, but it looks like the fleet has grown since.
Taking into account the previous Tesla Semi sightings, the EV maker must have delivered about a dozen trucks so far.
In December 2022, PepsiCo Vice President Mike O’Connell said in an interview with Reuters that the company plans to roll out 100 Tesla Semis in 2023, when it starts using the heavy-duty trucks to make deliveries to customers like Walmart and Kroger.
Of the planned fleet of 100 Tesla Semi trucks, 15 would be deployed from Modesto and 21 from Sacramento. Taking that into account, the photos above suggest the target for the Modesto facility has almost been met.
As for the rest of the fleet, O’Connell said PepsiCo is targeting a rollout in the central US next, followed by the East Coast.
In the same interview, the executive also revealed that PepsiCo is upgrading its charging infrastructure with four 750-kilowatt Tesla charging stalls at both its Frito-Lay Modesto and Pepsi Beverages Sacramento locations in California.
The Tesla Semi is currently built in low volumes at a facility near Gigafactory Nevada. The EV maker recently announced a $3.6 billion expansion of Giga Nevada for Tesla Semi mass production and 4680 battery cell production.
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